Category Archives: CG Discussion Guide

“A Lesson in Abram’s Faith” (Series: Five on Five: Genesis)

Scripture: Genesis 12:1-13:4

Sermon Summary 

The story of Abram’s call to leave his country and go to the land God calls him to is familiar and well-known. It is a story of incredible, radical faith. Leaving country, kindred, and his father’s home not only involved a difficult departure from beloved and cherished relationships, it also meant leaving behind his source of physical safety and security. And yet Abram exhibits incredible faith when he responds with obedience and he goes. 

We should be rightly challenged by Abram’s faith, a faith that heard what God called him to do and responded immediately with obedience despite all the sacrifices it meant he had to make. It is appropriate to feel challenged by Abram’s faith as we look at our own lives and compare our faith to his. We all have areas of our lives where we refuse to do what we know God would have us do. We refuse, are hesitant, or delay because we know it’s hard and requires sacrifice. 

But it’s also important to be inspired by Abram’s faith. The Scriptures remind us that the stories in the Old Testament serve as examples for us to follow (1 Cor. 10:6). Abram’s story is exactly that, a portrait of inspiring faith that we should long and pray to have. In the New Testament book of Hebrews, the author encouraged his readers in the great Hall of Fame of Faith chapter by pointing to the example of Abram (Heb. 11:8-9). Imagine the kind of power that would be unleashed in the church and its witness if we all exhibited the faith of Abram! 

Although Abram’s story should challenge and inspire believers, the story also means so much more than this. We need to see what it reveals about the God of Abram’s faith – a God who makes enduring, unbreakable, invincible promises to his people for no other reason than that he is gracious. God’s promise in verses 2-3 are sevenfold, and from the first to the seventh, they all hinge on God’s giving Abram and Sarai a child despite Sarai’s barrenness. However, when they arrive in Canaan they realize the land is barren as well. There is a famine in the land, and if there’s a famine, that means no food, no family, and no future. So Abram takes matters into his own hands and leaves for Egypt. 

It becomes clear that Abram had faith to obey God but he did not have faith to trust God. His faith in God was reverential (I’ll do what you say) but not personal (I’ll depend on you always). Abram lost sight of what God had actually said to him. There was only one command (“Go”) but there were seven promises (“I will…”). As important as it is to obey God, God wants us to trust in him. Faith is measured not by what we’re willing to do for God but by what we believe God is willing to do for us! Our faith then is exercised when we depend on God, not when we do for God. 

And God proves himself worthy to trust when despite the faithlessness of Abram he still leads him back to Canaan. God shows that his promise is enduring, unbreakable, and invincible. Ultimately God’s promise to Abram is fulfilled not in the birth of Isaac but another Son – his own Son. Jesus came from the line of Abram and came as the promised offspring to bring the blessing of salvation to the world. He came to secure for us the blessing he deserved and receive the curse that we deserved. Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s promise in Genesis 12 despite Abram’s, Israel’s and our faithlessness. So when we look at Jesus we see the visible reason God is worthy to be trusted. Nothing and nobody can ever derail, thwart, or overturn God’s promises to us. We should look at Jesus daily in order to be reminded daily that we can and should trust in God. 

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. Are you more challenged by Abram’s faith or inspired by his faith according to Genesis 12:1-9? 
   • If challenged by it, what are some of the areas of your life in which you feel obedience to God is necessary, even if it would require you to make sacrifices? What are the reasons/obstacles you find it hard to obey him? 
   • If inspired by it, what do you envision Abram-like faith would look like in your life? What would change or be different in your life if you were to actually live this out?
2. Do you think it’s easier to exercise faith by obeying God, or to exercise faith through trusting God? What has this looked like in your life? What makes these things easier or harder? 
3. Have you ever personally experienced the reality of God’s enduring, unbreakable, invincible promise for you despite your faithlessness toward him? How have you experienced God to be faithful to you when you lacked faith in him? Please share to encourage others. 
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate, and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one-sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“The Night’s Third Hour” (Series: The Dark Night of the Soul)

Scripture: Psalm 43:1-5

Sermon Summary 

Psalms 42 and 43 offer tremendous honesty about the hardships in life while also offering tremendous hope for believers to endure them. Although there are various thorns and thistles that poke and pierce Christians through the dark night of the soul, there is always a reason to rejoice. In these two psalms, the psalmist is constantly fighting to believe. He has to exhort himself again and again to “hope in God”. It’s important to understand that Christian maturity isn’t evidenced in the increasing infrequency by which you need to exhort yourself in this way. It’s quite the opposite. Spiritual growth is evidenced by how quickly a believer runs to God in their time of need. This is why after each of his three laments, the psalmist returns to his exhortation three times. 

By the end of Psalm 43, although the night gets darker and troubles keep visiting the psalmist, there is clear evidence of amazing inward renewal and revival in his soul. Despite all that he’s endured, the author is finally able to confess that God is his exceeding joy. How did he get to this point? And how can believers get there as well? The psalmist engages in three actions: remembrance, resolution, and anticipation. 

Remember (42:4). There is incredible power in remembering. Christians are called to remember the gospel. To recall what Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, did for sinners upon the cross 2,000 years ago. In the midst of the dark night, it’s easy to forget what was accomplished by Jesus for those who would believe in him. In trials, forgetting simple truths like God’s love, his care, and his presence is all too common. But to remember the gospel is to see the clear evidence that God loves his people so much that he sent his Son to die for them; God’s care is so incredible that he came to the world to experience and sympathize with his people in their suffering; and he’s present with believers always and until the end of the age because he sent his Holy Spirit to indwell them. You must remember the gospel.

Resolve (42:8). But remembrance cannot remain in the past. Christians must act upon and respond to the gospel with new resolve. Not because the gospel is lacking but because the benefits of the gospel need to be seized and believed. Acquiring information alone is not enough to bring about change and transformation. There must be a response of new resolves to trust, commit, obey, or repent. The Bible is not afraid of these kinds of imperatives that flow out of the gospel. In the dark night, remembering the gospel triggers a response to the gospel such as going to God with your tears, surrounding yourself with godly company, singing songs until you believe, and running to God as your rock. 

Anticipate (43:3-4). Remembering the past and responding in the present helps anticipate the glorious hope God has called believers to. The psalmist lamented in Psalm 42:4, “When shall I come and appear before God?” By the end of the third refrain, he speaks with confidence, “Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy.” His hopeful future anticipation is enough for him to endure his present circumstances (he is far from Jerusalem) and his present experience (he is at the hands of ungodly people). And yet for the Christian, the promises of God are far greater than appearing before the altar of God. Through the work of Christ, Christians have gained access to a place past the altar, into the Holy Place, through the curtain now torn in two, and into the Holy of Holies. In the Jerusalem temple, this was the place that only the high priest could go. But Jesus, through offering himself up as our sacrifice, has made this way possible. He has given us access to God’s throne of grace, where we will one day be with him forever. This is the glorious future where believers are being led by God’s light and truth through the present dark night. This gives us reason to rejoice even in the darkest hour. 

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. Faith is not a walk in the park. The psalmist has to exhort himself again and again to “believe” what he knows. This question is in two parts. 1) What goes wrong when we think having faith is “easy”? 2) What is helpful knowing that sometimes Christians need to exhort themselves again and again to hope in God? 
2. Of the three actions – remembrance, resolution and anticipation – which of these is easiest for you to do? Or what is most “natural” or “familiar” to do? Why do you think that is? Of the three actions, which do you need to commit to do more regularly? 
3. Are there any dangers when you focus on any one of the three actions more than the others? What would the consequences be? What is powerful about seeing the psalmist doing all three?  
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“Prayer for Enlightened Hearts” (Series: From the Mountain Peak)

Scripture: Ephesians 1:15-19

Sermon Summary 

Paul prays for the Ephesian believers in both Ephesians 1:15-23 and Ephesians 3:14-19 that they would know the gospel with more than just their heads but that they would grasp the gospel with their hearts. This happens through prayer as the Holy Spirit leads gospel information in your head to gospel transformation in your heart. Experiencing the power of the gospel doesn’t simply occur when you learn more. The Spirit takes the benefits and blessings of the gospel and seals it on believers’ hearts so that we might experience now a foretaste of the glorious realities to come. 

This prayer is aimed toward believers, not unbelievers, because it’s clear that even Christians can hear the gospel and be unchanged by it. Many times we read God’s Word, hear it preached and shared with us and yet it remains irrelevant to us. Gospel truths remain propositions to consider and never become power to change. So in response, Paul asks the Holy Spirit to illuminate the gospel realities of Ephesians 1:3-14 into the hearts of Christians. This is why he asks the Spirit of wisdom and revelation to enlighten the eyes of our hearts. When we pray and make the same request of the Spirit, the gospel begins to connect with us because it begins to connect in us, our head and our heart. 

So how does abstract knowledge begin to be of actual good for us? Paul prays for three doctrines to become present realities in believers hearts to transform us. These three things are summaries of the benefits of the gospel: our hope, inheritance and God’s power. 

1. Our hope in salvation means not that we will be forgiven at some future time but that we are forgiven this very moment. God has called us to himself through Christ and has already begun saving us (he has justified us – made us right with God; he is sanctifying us – making us more like God; he will glorify us – make us finally and wholly renewed). But already that means God is pleased with us today in Christ, not just that he will be pleased with us when we enter heaven. We’re transformed now to live under the delight and smile of God as his children.

2. The riches of our glorious inheritance is not material riches but spiritual ones. However spiritual riches are not a future possession but a present one. We have obtained an inheritance (Eph. 1:11) and God has already blessed us with every spiritual blessing (Eph. 1:3). So we don’t live as people who will one day be rich but who are rich in Christ right now with the wealth that truly matters. We’re transformed now to become generous people with every form of currency we can offer others, material, financial, time, energy and comfort. 

3. The power of God that he works in us is resurrection power that he worked in raising Jesus from the dead. This is a power that overcame the grave and overturned evil and sin forever. When this power is at work in believers, we can both triumphantly resist sin and victoriously strive after holiness. Sin is not too great and holiness not too hard that believers are discouraged from slaying their sin and pursuing their holiness. We’re transformed now to fight sin not with the strength of our own wills but with the power of God that he makes available to us.

Jesus makes the blessings of the gospel available to us by his grace which is received through faith. In the same way, all that he makes real in our lives by his Spirit is to be received through prayer. Just as faith is not earning and achieving the blessings of the gospel, so prayer is not earning and achieving the experience of the gospel. But by prayer the Spirit is pleased to enlighten the eyes of our hearts to live out in our hearts what we possess and know in our heads. 

In response, when we receive gospel information we should learn the habit of asking the Spirit through prayer to make it become gospel transformation in our lives. Whether that’s through personal Bible reading, through hearing a sermon or through receiving gospel encouragement through others (relationships, articles, books, etc). 

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. Agree or disagree: It is easier to accumulate gospel information in your heads than it is to experience gospel transformation in your hearts. Why do you think this is? Related: Why do you think people are more satisfied with a discipleship that focuses on learning gospel information rather than undergoing gospel transformation? 
2. What are some realities and truths of the gospel that you want to be able to live out of and want more deeply impressed on your heart? (*you can look at Ephesians 1:3-14 if you need some help) What would look differently about your Christian life if these gospel truths were experienced and evidenced? 
3. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
4. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“The Fullness of Time” (Series: From the Mountain Peak)

Scripture: Ephesians 1:9-10

Sermon Summary 

There are many things that we wish God would reveal to us but in his sovereign wisdom he has decided not to. What he has chosen to make known to us is the mystery of his will. Simply put, this mystery is the gospel of Jesus Christ and the way that both Jews and Gentiles (non-Jews) can enter the family of God by grace through faith in Christ (Ephesians 3:6). But the gospel is bigger news and greater hope than just individual, personal redemption. It also provides the hope of cosmic redemption which includes the redemption of our personal stories as well as the history of the world. 

Paul states that all things will be united in Christ. All things refers not just to our spirits but to our bodies as well. It includes spiritual and physical things. As in-flesh people, we are formed by experiences that are both good and bad, shaped by memories that are helpful and harmful. But in the final redemption, all of who we are will be redeemed in Christ. All things also includes creation and history. The world in which we live and move. And all things will be redeemed because all things were affected by sin’s curse in the fall. Sin’s destructive power wasn’t limited to our relationship with God but was woven into the fabric of creation and thus is seen and experienced in all of life. The curse in Genesis 3 when Adam and Eve disobeyed God wasn’t merely exile from God’s presence. It was a deterioration of the entire world. As a result, there is brokenness not only in us but around us. We are fallen but we also live in a fallen world. This is why nothing every goes right. This is why life is hard and unfair. 

Into this situation God sent Jesus in the fullness of time to unite all things in his Son. The word “unite” can also mean “to sum up.” It’s only in Christ that all of this sin-cursed world will be made right, reordered and renewed. Christ will sum it up and restore it. Our stories and history itself are not aimlessly circular but everything is heading toward this hopeful destination. Jesus promises a cosmic redemption of all things in him. When our lives are full of frustration and the world is full of fragmentation, we can feel so helpless and powerless to put anything together. But where our attempts at redemption fail, Christ succeeds. He is the one who will put your shattered life and this hurting world back together again. He is the Cosmic Redeemer. 

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. What elements of the gospel do you think is often missing in how unbelievers and even Christians often think about it? Articulate how this view of cosmic redemption can be more hopeful and appealing than a more narrow view of the gospel. 
2. When sin is limited to only what separates you and God, we underestimate the pervasive destructive power of sin. Not only do we personally sin and are personally sinned against, but we live in a broken world marked with sin. Can you share how you have seen sin exposed in the world? In what specific ways have you seen evidence of sin’s pervasiveness?
3. If you are willing to share, what kinds of things in your life are you most looking forward to seeing redeemed/summed up/united in Christ? What aspects of the brokenness of the world do you looking forward to most seeing redeemed/summed up/united in Christ? 
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“God’s Rich Grace” (Series: From the Mountain Peak)

Scripture: Ephesians 1:7-8

Sermon Summary 

Christianity is distinct from other religions in that grace is the central operating principle. Whereas the message of other religions is that we relate and reach God by our works, Christianity says that God comes to us extending his grace. This grace not only saves believers but also sustains believers. In Ephesians 1:7-8 we learn that God is both rich in grace and generous with grace to all who go to him. 

In Jesus we receive redemption and forgiveness. Although these points are related they refer to different things. Redemption in the Bible means releasing a person from captivity or paying a ransom to set somebody free from slavery. God redeemed humanity from slavery to sin by the ransom price of Christ’s blood. But this was a costly sacrifice. What did God gain by sacrificing Jesus for us? He gained us but is that worth giving us his one and only Son? God in his love declared that it was. God did this not because of something desirable in us but because of the gracious desire in his heart. 

But we most realize that God did not redeem us as innocent, righteous saints but as guilty, unrighteous sinners. We were law-breakers and transgressors and so after redeeming us, God forgave us. This makes it clear that God intended to redeem those who did not deserve it. Paul makes sure we do not lose sight of our gracious Redeemer when he describes our gracious redemption. God redeems and forgives “according to the riches of his grace” which is very different than saying God redeems and forgiveness “out of the riches of his grace.” The sacrifice of his Son was in proportion to his rich grace because of the infinite worth and value of Jesus. The riches of God’s grace is matched then by his generosity when he lavished his grace upon us. This Greek word translates to “abundantly gave us” or “gave us more than we needed.” It becomes very clear that the God of the gospel is rich in grace and generous with grace to all who go to him. 

If all of this is true, there are at least three gospel realities we must live in. First, if God is rich in grace, we can take our biggest failures and darkest secrets to him because he won’t runaway. Second, if God is generous with grace, we should regularly ask to receive what he loves to give because he won’t withhold anything from us. And third, if God is rich in and generous with grace to us, then we can show grace to those we may consider undeserving.

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. God reveals himself as gracious over and over again in the Bible. Anybody who has read it will know this much. How well do you think Christians in general and you in particular highlight and display this truth? If somebody looked closely at your lifestyle, would they be able to conclude that the God you believe and obey is primarily a gracious God? 
2. Can you think of specific things Christians do that blur the message of grace and things Christians do that promote this message of grace? Or how have you personally seen it blurred or promoted? Share examples. 
3. Pick one of the three exhortations and give an example of what it would look like to truly live in this gospel reality. What will your life look like if you actually live out this truth? 
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“Predestined for Adoption” (Series: From the Mountain Peak)

Scripture: Ephesians 1:5-6

Sermon Summary 

The doctrine of election and predestination can be tricky to understand but one thing is clear, they do not present God as cold and heartless. In fact Paul claims in Ephesians 1 that God’s purpose in election was to adopt us as sons to himself. Election then was the beginning stages of our adoption process! This means our salvation is not simply redemptive (slaves set free from spiritual bondage) but it’s ultimately relational (orphans made his sons and fought into his family). Paul teaches us that in love God desired and determined to make us sons in his Son. 

Adoption is a definitive and legal status change by which we are brought into God’s family and given a new status as sons. We are no longer slaves and orphans. This is an objective reality that is true regardless of whether we feel it to be true or not. God has done this work and nothing we can do, not even our worst sins, can undo his adopting work. We are given an irreversible new name, new identity and new status. And in our adoption, God becomes our Father. This is why adoption is a glorious blessing and the crown joy of believers in their salvation. God’s fatherly identity is available to us through Jesus. God gave us his Son in order to gain us as sons. And being united now to Jesus, the Son of God, we now receive adoption as sons of God. 

Being sons of God in the Son of God means also that the affections of the Father for Jesus are the same affections he has for us. In fact, in Christ we receive the very love that was reserved for and deserved by Jesus himself. Sharing in his sonship, we become God’s beloved. That’s why in Ephesians 5:1 Paul writes, “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children.” United to the Beloved of God, we now are beloved by God which means no depth of our sin or magnitude of our failure can reverse and rewrite God’s adoption. In Christ, we are not more loved by God at our best and we are not less loved by God at our worst.

The glories of adoption are countless but here are at least two things that will happen when we grasp our adoption. First, our prayers become more intimate. When we address God, we have the great privilege of calling him “Father.” We don’t have to dress up our words to God hoping they’ll get his attention but we can pray earnestly and intimately because we already have his ear and his favor through Christ. Second, our prayer requests become more vulnerable. Calling God “Father” reminds us that we are all his needy, dependent children. Instead of trying to put our best foot forward, we can honestly and vulnerably share how we need our loving Father to meet us in our lives. As a result of this, we share and we pray to our Father in heaven as his children. 

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. Free discussion on the passage/sermon: Did you come to understand anything new or better? Was there anything that was clarified for you, convicted you, confused you, challenged you or comforted you? Share, comment, reflect on any part of Ephesians 1:5-6 that stood out.
2. How do you feel about addressing or viewing God as “Father”? Is this normal for you or foreign to you? Easy for you or difficult for you? Why is is our adoption the “crown jewel” of the gospel and the highest privilege to enjoy? 
3. What are the obstacles to sharing prayer requests more vulnerably and honestly? Spell out in your own words how being a child of God affects our prayers and our prayer requests. 
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“Every Spiritual Blessing” (Series: From the Mountain Peak)

Scripture: Ephesians 1:3-4

Sermon Summary 

Ephesians 1 can be divided into two sections. The first section (1:3-14) deals with Paul’s praise of God for the gift of every spiritual blessing that believers are blessed with in Jesus Christ. The second section (1:15-23) deals with Paul’s prayer to God asking for opened spiritual eyes to grasp the full reality of these blessings. Verses 3-4 begin the extended praise portion of chapter 1. From these verses we are challenged with this gospel truth: A grasp of our spiritual blessings will lead us to sing God’s blessings and sacrifice material blessings.

Although Paul could have communicated chapter 1 in propositional statements about our salvation, he chooses instead to sing them in doxology. Paul begins by blessing God and this sets the trajectory of everything that follows. It is an extension of praise. God is blessed because he has blessed us. He has done this first with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. This is not a reference to heaven itself but a reference to the unseen world of spiritual reality. Our blessings are not earthly and material but spiritual and heavenly. Paul lists some of these blessing for us which include adoption, redemption, forgiveness and an inheritance. These are blessings we truly need but could never achieve on our own. However in Christ they are now ours. We are in full possession of them. 

God chose to bestow upon us every spiritual blessing even though we can only offer him our every spiritual blemish. By his grace he gives us these things not based on our effort but based on his election. God, out of the good pleasure of his will, chose us before the foundation of the world to be in Christ and thus he chose to shower us with the blessings that Christ earned and merited. Because our blessings come to us by our faith union with Jesus, these blessings are secured for us. They cannot be forfeited or taken but are forever ours because of Christ’s perfection and performance. A grasp of these spiritual blessings will lead a Christian to do at least two things. 

First, we will sing blessings to God. One evidence of how well we understand what Christ has done for us is seen in the presence or absence of worship in our lives. Those who have received every spiritual blessing desire to sing blessings to God because they understand the magnitude of the gift and also the magnitude of the grace. Growth in the gospel is evidenced not by the precision of our words in explaining the gospel but by the presence of worship in exalting over the gospel. Worship reveals we have experienced the gospel, not just understood it. When we grasp our spiritual blessings, we prioritize blessing God in our lives. 

Second, we will sacrifice material blessings for others. Just as Jesus was pleased to share his spiritual blessings with us, we can be pleased to share with others our material blessings. This is because we understand we are rich in the ways that truly matter. A conviction of what we have in Christ makes us hold more to his blessings and loosens our grip over other blessings. Then in the practice of sacrificial generosity, we learn to love less our material blessings and cherish more our spiritual blessings. The act of giving forces us to look more at what we have abundantly in Christ because we are less distracted by what material blessings we have or don’t have. Becoming sacrificially generous with material blessings then is not just good for others but is spiritually beneficial for us. 

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. Free discussion on the passage/sermon: Did you come to understand anything new or better? Was there anything that was clarified for you, convicted you, confused you, challenged you or comforted you? Share, comment, reflect on any part of Ephesians 1:3-4 that stood out.
2. If blessing God is evidence of knowing and rejoicing in your spiritual blessings, do you have any kind of rhythm of “praising,” “worshiping,” or “blessing” God in your life? What does that look like? What results when a person grows in knowledge of the gospel but not in worship because of the gospel? 
3. How has the practice of generosity revealed more of the spiritual blessings you have in Christ? How has a habit of stinginess blurred your awareness the spiritual blessings you have in Christ? Share. What are some ways to cultivate sacrificial generosity that reflects the gospel to others and reminds yourself of the gospel?
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship Jesus more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.

“The End of All Ends” (Series: From the Mountain Peak)

Scripture: Ephesians 1:3-14

Sermon Summary 

These twelve verses in Ephesians 1 are an explosion of praise that come out of the mouth of Paul faster than he can talk and write. Comprising just one single verse in the original Greek, Paul suspends the rules of grammar for a moment in order to revel in the glory of God in our salvation. From the mountain peak he declares the end of all ends, the final destination to which all roads in history lead: the glory of God. This includes our salvation. Paul teaches us in these verses that we are saved for God’s glory in order to live for God’s glory. 

The Diversity of Persons: The Christian doctrine of God makes it clear that there is one God who exists in three persons (Father, Son, and Spirit). Each person is fully God but there are not three gods. Our God is triune, meaning he is three in one. When it comes to our salvation, each person of the Trinity is work. God the Father authors it (vv.3-5), God the Son accomplishes it (v.7) and God the Spirit applies it (v.13). All three persons of the Godhead work in order to secure the believer’s salvation which was authored before the foundation of the world, accomplished on the cross of Calvary, and is being applied to the lives of people presently. 

The intricacy and the complexity of our salvation reveal the incredible love of God for sinful humanity. Without hesitation, disagreement or quarreling, all three persons of the Trinity worked together not just to make salvation possible but to actually save sinners. From beginning to end and from start to finish, salvation is fully and entirely in the hands of our God and never in ours. And despite the repelling nature of our disobedience and sin, it was God’s love and not our loveliness that compelled him toward us. If salvation is completely God’s work alone on our behalf, how should we respond?

The Unity of Purpose: Apostle Paul makes it clear that the end for which God saved us is “to the praise of his glory” (vv.5-6, 12, 14). There is no reason after this reason. And because it is God who saves us entirely and completely, we cannot seek to attain any self glory nor try to take partial credit for our salvation. It is right and proper instead to admire the mighty arm of God in saving us. So we will either continue to insist that we are participants in our salvation or will be accept that we are nothing more than mere recipients of divine grace. The reality is that God gets the glory in our salvation because he alone authored, accomplished and applies it to us. 

Paul then says that those who are saved now live and exist with a new life purpose: to live for the praise of God’s glory (v.12). All the mundane and ordinary things about our lives becomes royal and regal when they’re done for the glory of the King of Kings. When our purpose becomes his purpose, our lives are repurposed. From the way we work to the way we study, we do all things with the aim of of praising his glory. But it’s not just a matter of what we do but how we do it. Through our attitudes and the postures of our heart, we are able to bring God glory. From the simplest of tasks to the most spiritual tasks, we make it our aim to declare his glory.

Suggested Group Discussion Questions 

1. What difference does it make, if any, to articulate how all three persons of the Trinity work for your salvation rather than thinking about it simply as, “God saves us”? Was anything surprising, shocking or stirring about this articulation? 
2. How does it sit with you that God does all things for his own glory? Be honest. What is your response and reaction to this? What would be the reasons this truth is rejected or difficult to accept? Can you articulate why it’s ultimately a good thing for God to do all things, including save sinners, for his glory? 
3. Do you easily see how the ordinary, mundane things in life can be done for the praise of God’s glory? If there is a struggle, describe it. Why do you think many people only perceive spiritual tasks to be for God’s glory but have a more difficult time believing that ordinary, maybe even “secular” tasks can be done for his glory as well? 
4. Doxology: Express how this sermon helps you understand, appreciate and worship God more. In what ways has the gospel become more alive to you having read this passage and heard this sermon? 
5. Response: Formulate a one sentence prayer that’s informed by the passage and the sermon. This prayer should articulate what you desire to walk away and how you want God to apply it in your life. Have a few people share what they came up with.